From Barcelonnette to south we chose D 908 instead of Col de la Cayolle (this would be actual part of the Route des Grandes Alpes). I think it is more interesting to ride Col d’Allos & Col des Champs (like we did)!
But before it starts to climb to the mountain Pass you need ride a long time endlessly twisting road following the valley. The river below you goes further and further while you’re climbing higher and higher.
Finally I had to stop and check if I can see the river anymore??!!
Then starts the actual climb to the Col d’Allos:
In the top of this beautiful mountain pass we saw absolutely stunning views and I took the best picture of the whole trip here!
Wanna see this picture in bigger size? Click here!
When riding down from Col d’Allos I had a very scary moment (03:55 in the video)!! A car came from the opposite direction just behind the blind corner… and the road is very narrow and there are no rails! I think my heart stopped for a second!!! But luckily I didn’t have too much speed.
Then we rode Col des Champs! This was extremely narrow road in the middle of the forest. It felt like a jogging-path or a mountainbike-path! It had bumps and dikes… But luckily no traffic! Also in the top of Col des Champs was very quiet (and beautiful!)
The road down from Col des Champs (to east) is wider and easier to ride.
Then we rode to Valberg tourist- ans skiresort and from there we rode to Col de la Couillole.
(video here)
From there we were all waiting the final climb for this day -Col de Turini! But before we found the right mountain pass we took the wrong turn!! (Or actually we didn’t make the turn!) After missing the turn the GPS told us to climb to Ilonse… and we did!
It was 13 kilometers ride to the wrong direction!! But luckily it was very nice road and we didn’t feel bad to ride it back…
…So we could finally start the way to Col de Turini. It is simply amazing! There are so many tight corners and hairpins that I think I was feeling a little bit dizzy! And also it felt like it’s climbing a lot! Like at least 2500 meters! But actually the summit of the Turini is “only” 1607 meters high!! But gosh! What an amazing ride!!
That red spot is Timo with his Honda VFR!
From the south-end of Turini we still had few nice corners to ride (from Sospel to Menton) -or actually our place to stay was Le Relais de Monti few kilometers noth from the city of Menton. We would spend the next 3 nights here! (Nice place, I recommend it!)
The route for the day 11 was like this!